BAY AREA POETS REVIEW
Poetry Salons & Workshops
Autumn Poetry Salons & Workshops Offered by Jannie Dresser
POETRY SALONS
There are now 7 groups in 7 locations held throughout each month. Participants gather in a comfortable home to read and discuss poets and poetry. Here are the topics and dates for October. A small fee (between $5-10 is requested); no one turned away for lack of funds. Reservations are required but you do not have to commit to attending every session. Contact me to make a reservation or for more info: janniedres@att.net.
Sunday, October 2: 3-5:30
North Berkeley (near Solano & Marin avenues)
“POE-Etics: Edgar Allan Poe and His Aftermath.”
Still one of America's most popular poets, Poe had a tremendous influence on 19th century French poetry, leading to the Symbolist movement, which in turn influenced the Modernists of the early 20th century. In addition, he developed theory for the musicality in poetry, articulating how words can be understood as notes and sounds in a more musical sense than many poets had understood previously.
Saturday, October 8: 2-4:30
Livermore
“POE-Etics: Edgar Allan Poe and His Aftermath”
Sunday, October 9, 1-3:30
Crockett
“Vive Les Symbolistes: French Symbolism & Modernism”
We pick up where we had left off with Edgar Allan Poe and take a look at the early French Symbolists to see how they viewed the role of the poet and poetry itself. They, in turn, became powerful forces for shaping Modernist poetry.
Sat., 10/15, 2-4:30
Marin
“Godparents of American Poetry: Emily Dickinson & Walt Whitman”
"The Godparents of American Poetry: Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman." A great intro or refresher course in two seminal American poets and poetry styles.
Sunday, October 16: 11:30-2
Walnut Creek
“Harlem Renaissance Poets”
The amazing confluence of the Great African-American migration to northern cities, bringing with them jazz and a country-south culture, along with new Black immigrants from the Caribbean, and the advances of women in the 1920s, made Harlem in this period an exciting creative center. Few realize how much impact was made by the men and the many women who participated in this cultural shift in Black consciousness. We will study many of the poets of this period, with attention to the larger American context.
Sunday, October 16: 3-5:30
North Oakland
“Roots & Branches of Free Verse after Whitman”
What hath Whitman wrought? Thankfully, the "godfather" of American poetry broke the mold of musty traditional verse by introducing his King James' Bible influences of cadence, powerful imagery and his camera's eye, and use of techniques such as parallelism. American (and world) poetry has not been the same since, though it took many decades for his experiment to catch on.
Monday, October 17: 1-3 (NEW GROUP)
Rossmoor, Walnut Creek/Lafayette “Godparents of American Poetry: Emily Dickinson & Walt Whitman"
If you are interested in getting a group started in your area, feel free to contact me.
Salons are held on a first-come/first-serve basis. There is a nominal fee for drop-in, $5-10. Two new groups have recently formed in Marin and at Rossmoor in Walnut Creek/Lafayette.
Contact Jannie Dresser for address if you wish to attend: janniedres@att.net. Participants do not have to make a commitment to attend every session, but reservations for each meeting are required.
HISTORY
In Summer of 2011, we launched several Poetry Salons throughout the Bay Area to bring together poets and those who love poetry to read and discuss poems in the American literary tradition.
Salons are held once a month, on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon, in a comfortable home in one of seven Bay Area locations. Between 8 to 20 people attend each Salon. The format is provided by Jannie Dresser, MFA, editor and publisher of the BAY AREA POETS REVIEW.
POTENTIAL DISCUSSION TOPICS
* America’s Poet Laureates
* Imagism: Pound, Williams, Amy Lowell,
* American Modernism: Wallace Stevens, T.S. Eliot, Gertrude Stein, e.e. cummings
* The Fugitive Poets [associated with Vanderbilt University in Tennesee]: John Crowe Ransom, Allen Tate, Robert Penn Warren, Laura Riding
* Great Persona Poets: SpoonRiver, Langston Hughes, Marilyn Nelson
* Harlem Renaissance Poets
* Émigré Poets in America: Robert Louis Sevenson, Joseph Brodsky, Charles Simic, Nina Cassian
* The Continentalists: poets deeply inspired by European tradition, i.e., W.S. Merwin
* Saying what we shouldn't: confessional poetics & its backlash.
* The spiritual thread in American poetry: Puritans to Mary Oliver
* The spooky tradition: Poe to Lovecraft
* Poetry and democracy: a vision of Carl Sandburg et al
* Early mavericks (poets writing outside of academic tradition)
* Poets of Canada
* Poets of Mexico
* Symbolist merry-go-round: Poe to Baudelaire; Mallarme to Wallace Stevens
* Early California poets: Ina Coolbrith, Edwin Markham, Joaquin Miller, Ambrose Bierce, Bret Harte, Charles Stoddard, et al
* Humorist poets: Ogden Nash, Dorothy Parker, Robert Service
* Accessibility and erudition in American poetry
* Vietnam era poets: Yusef Koumanyaka, Bruce Weigl, Robert Bly, Denise Levertov, et al
or poets emerging from recent wars: Bruce Turner, for example
* American nature poetry tradition
* The "fireside poets": Longfellow, Lowell, Whittier, Emerson, et al
* Asian influences
Early modernists: Edna St. Vincent Millay, Edgar Guest, T.S. Eliot, e.e. cummings
* poets of the Harlem Renaissance
* The Black Mountain Poets: Charles Olson, Larry Eigner, Robert Duncan, Ed Dorn, Denise Levertov, Robert Creely
Great poet groupies: Marianne Moore and Elizabeth Bishop; Robert Lowell, Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath
* Emerson's influence: "The Poet" and his Harvard talk on American literature
* Whitman through Ginsberg: the Hebraic tradition in free-verse poetry
* Protest songs/poems
* accessibility and erudition in American poetry
* Some great female American poets: Louise Bogan, Elizabeth Bishop, Marianne Moore, Edna St. Vincent Millay
* Playing with the net down: early free versers
* Playing with the net in place: poets in meter (Frost)
Edna St. Vincent Millay (Artist Trading Card by Jannie Dresser)
WORKSHOPS & RETREATS
CHAPBOOK WORKSHOP
IN OAKLAND
Begins October 11
A 10-week workshop to complete a manuscript; includes organization, critique of individual poems and the manuscript as a whole, publishing options.
For poets who have a set of 18-25 poems to turn into a chapbook.
Starting October 11 in Oakland.
10 Tuesday Evenings, 7:15-9:30
Group size limited to 8.
$200.
ONE-DAY WRITING INTENSIVES
For poets and prose writers.
Sunday, October 30
11 a.m.-4 p.m.
Crockett
“Writing the Super-Natural”
Saturday, November 5
Noon-5 p.m.
Crockett
“Gratitude & Remembrance”
Saturday, December 1st
Noon-5 p.m.
Crockett
“Music in Poetry: Fine-tuning Your Free Verse Ear”
Each 5-hour session is $40 or $100 for all three (paid in full at first session):
Crockett is located about 20 minutes north of Berkeley on Highway 80, just below the Carquinez Bridge.
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"WRITING OUT OF WINTER"
WEEKEND RETREAT
For women writers and artists.
Friday, January 27th thru Monday, January 30th
Gualala, California.
$250, plus cost of shared transportation and providing for one meal.
We will stay in an elegant home on the Pacific Highway, overlooking the ocean (hot-tub, beach access, art table, plus workshop and good food).
Our theme will be "Dancing in the dark: tackling life's obstacles and blues without losing your mind, heart or sense of humor."
For information on any of the above, contact Jannie Dresser, janniedres@att.net.
Jannie has been teaching poetry in the Bay Area for over 25 years. She is the co-founder and publisher of the Bay Area Poets Review (http://bayareapoetsreview.com) and SF Poetry Examiner at examiner. com.
MORE ABOUT SALONS
Salons are held in the following cities:
BERKELEY/ALBANY
1st Sundays, 3-5:30 p.m.
HOST: Gail Peterson
October 2
November 6
December 4
***
CROCKETT/ VALLEJO/ BENICIA/ PINOLE/ HERCULES
2nd Sundays
1-3:30 p.m.
HOST: Jannie Dresser
October 9
November 13
December 11
***
MARIN/ SAN RAFAEL/ CORTE MADERA
3rd Saturdays, 2-4:30 p.m.
HOST: Yvonne Postelle
October 15
November 19
December 17
***
NORTH OAKLAND
3rd (or 4th) Sundays
3-5:30 p.m.
HOSTS: Jeff Ghent & Sandra Lessenden
October 16
November 20
December 18
***
LIVERMORE/ PLEASANTON/ DUBLIN
2nd Saturdays
2-4:30 p.m.
HOST: Carrie McAbee
October 8
November 12
December 10
***
WALNUT CREEK/ CONCORD/PLEASANT HILL
3rd Sundays
11:30-2 p.m.
HOST: Deborah Fruchey
October 16
November 20
December 18
***
ROSSMOOR
WALNUT CREEK/LAFAYETTE/ORINDA
HOST: Marc Hofstadter
3rd Mondays
1-3 p.m.
October 17
November 21
December 19
SALON LOCATIONS UNDER CONSIDERATION:
SAN FRANCISCO
PETALUMA/SEBASTAPOL/
SANTA ROSA
2ND EAST BAY: OAKLAND/BERKELEY GROUP
